A talk on the Glens Falls Water System – Then & Now, has been set for Tuesday, March 27th at 7 pm at the Chapman Museum, 348 Glen Street, Glens Falls.

Chapman Museum Director, Tim Weidner will present the history of the development of Glens Falls’ water system from the 1860s, when a variety of ideas were floated to meet the growing community’s water needs, through 1936 when Halfway Brook Reservoir was constructed. To bring the story up to the present, City Engineer, Steve Gurzler will provide information about the current system, including the filtration plant in Cole’s Woods. » Continue Reading.

The Chapman Historical Museum in Glens Falls has just published Water & Light: S.R. Stoddard’s Lake George, a new work on the photography of Seneca Ray Stoddard.

The 160-page book features 150 of Stoddard’s photos, as well as some samples of his painting, sketches and cartography.

As a 19th century American photographer, S. R. Stoddard is often ranked with William Henry Jackson and Carlton Watkins, and the quality of his photographic compositions is compared with many of the Hudson River School painters. It is estimated Stoddard took some ten thousand images in the Adirondack Mountains alone. » Continue Reading.

The Chapman Museum in Glens Falls has announced a new fall exhibit, H2O: A Brief History of our Relationship to Water, which will open October 19th with a reception from 5:30 to 7:30 pm.

H2O examines the historical uses of water in the Glens Falls region from the mid-19th century, when people depended on private wells, to the present day. It explores the development of a municipal water supply after the Glens Falls fire of 1864, the transition from water power to electrical generators on the Hudson River, the role of the river and the Feeder Canal in transportation, and controversies surrounding pollution and access to the watershed. » Continue Reading.

Photographer Mark Bowie will present an illustrated talk, “Night over the Northeast,” on Tuesday, August 8 at 7 pm at the Chapman Museum in Glens Falls.

Based on his ongoing project to photograph the landscapes of New York and New England at night, Bowie will share the thought processes and techniques used to produce spectacular nocturnal images of the region’s mountains, woods, waters, villages and coastlines. » Continue Reading.

On Tuesday, July 25, at 7 pm, the Chapman Museum will host a program and book signing with photographer Carl Heilman II, who will discuss his book The Adirondacks: Season by Season.

In 2015, for an Adirondack Life project, Carl Heilman photographed a single dramatic Adirondack scene throughout the entire year. Beginning with a pre-dawn hike on a brisk mid-January morning, and ending with a unique clouds motion sequence on Dec 30, he hiked the mile and a half, and 1,500 feet of elevation up the Giant Mountain Ridge trail 35 times to photograph the changes in each of the 12 months. Carl also shot video and time lapse sequences to convey the feeling of being there at this single location over a year’s time. » Continue Reading.

The Chapman Historical Museum has opened a new mini-exhibit of Seneca Ray Stoddard photographs. Featured are images of the stage coach trip that visitors in the 1870s experienced from the train station in Glens Falls to the Fort William Henry Hotel at the south end of Lake George. In addition to the Halfway House, highlights include the tollhouse in French Mountain, Bloody Pond, Col. Ephraim Williams’ monument, and the grounds of the hotel. » Continue Reading.

Tuesday, February 21, at 1 pm at the Chapman Museum in Glens Falls, Chapman Curator Jillian Mulder will present an illustrated talk about Seneca Ray Stoddard’s multi-year trip up the Atlantic coast in a canoe entitled Stoddard’s Adventure on “The Atlantis.”

Over the course of five years, from 1883-1887, Glens Falls photographer Seneca Ray Stoddard completed a five stage journey by canoe. Stoddard and a companion traveled down the Hudson River to New York City and northward up the Atlantic coast, finally ending at the Bay of Fundy, Canada. It was the first time a small craft of that size had ventured the nearly 2,000 miles following the New England coast to the Canadian Maritimes. » Continue Reading.

The Chapman Museum in Glens Falls will host William R. Griffith, author of the new book, The Battle of Lake George: England’s First Triumph in the French and Indian War (History Press, 2016) on Sunday, September 25th at 2 pm.

In the early morning of September 8, 1755, a force of French Regulars, Canadians and Indians crouched unseen in a ravine south of Lake George. Under the command of French general Jean-Armand, Baron de Dieskau, the men ambushed the approaching British forces, sparking a bloody conflict for control of the lake and its access to New York’s interior. British commander William Johnson rallied his men through the barrage of enemy fire to send the French retreating north to Ticonderoga. The stage was set for one of the most contested regions throughout the rest of the conflict. » Continue Reading.

The Chapman Museum will host a talk on stereo view photographers, “Not Stoddard: Stereoviews,” on Tuesday, June 21 at 7 pm.

People often mistakenly assume that S. R. Stoddard was the only landscape photographer in the region, but he was just one of several who produced stereographs in the mid-to-late 19th century. » Continue Reading.

The Chapman Museum’s 2016 Wild Whiskers Beard Contest will take place Thursday, April 7, from 6 to 8 pm at Davidson Brothers Brewing Co., 1043 Route 9 in Queensbury.

This year the Beard Contest will include a special category, Mountain Man, inspired by the gnarly beard of legendary Adirondack guide, Old Mountain Phelps. Other categories include: Natural Full Beard, Groomed Full Beard, Partial Beard (including sideburns), Mustache Only, and Whiskerina (Fake Beard). » Continue Reading.

This year the Glens Falls – Queensbury Historical Association, which operates the Chapman Museum, celebrates its founding 50 years ago. To kick off the occasion the museum will host a free open house on Saturday, December 5, from 10 am to 4 pm, and a special reception Saturday evening from 5 to 7:30 pm for members and other supporters. Guests are also invited to explore the Holiday Display in the historic DeLong House, which this year will feature a 1912 Christmas. » Continue Reading.

In the spirit of Adirondack Guide “Old Mountain” Phelps the Chapman Museum in Glens Falls will hold a “Wild Whiskers Beard Contest, an evening of Beards & Beers”, on Thursday, March 26, from 6-8 pm at Davidson Bros. Brewery, 1043 Rout 9, in Queensbury.

Prizes will be Awarded in Four Categories: Mountain Man (Natural Full Beard), Dapper Gent (Groomed Full Beard), Maverick (Partial Beard, Mustache, Sideburns), and Hoaxer (Fake Beard). The fee to enter the contest is $10. Attendees will be able to vote for “Best Beard.” » Continue Reading.

The Chapman Museum’s new exhibit of 17 original Stoddard photographic prints features a mix of winter images from Glens Falls and Lake George to Saranac Lake. Subject matter includes both winter activities as well as scenic snow landscapes in the Adirondacks.

One highlight is a rare photograph of a winter camping scene that Stoddard hand-colored to reproduce as a color print. Others include images of hikers snowshoeing on Saranac Lake, ice fishing, snow covered street scenes in Glens Falls, and views of Lake George’s shoreline. The exhibit is a small sampling of the museum’s collection of over 4,000 Seneca Ray Stoddard photographs that document Glens Falls and the Adirondacks in the late 19th century. » Continue Reading.

On Thursday, May 15, at 7 pm, Lake George steamboat captain and local history author Bill Gates will present the program, “History of the Sagamore Hotel,” at Crandall Public Library, 251 Glen Street, Glens Falls.

Gates’ illustrated program, which will feature all three Sagamore hotels on that site, is presented by the Chapman Museum and the Folklife Center at Crandall Public Library in conjunction with their corresponding new exhibits At the Lake and Collecting Lake George: Maps, Prints, Postcards & Other Memorabilia. » Continue Reading.